


time and time again

by multifanwho



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, Basically all new who companions mentioned, F/F, One Shot, Regeneration (Doctor Who), Regeneration Angst (Doctor Who), Regeneration Speech, Short One Shot, Thirteenth Doctor Regeneration, high key just because rose and yaz are basically the same, y'all are going to hate me lmao
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-23
Updated: 2019-10-23
Packaged: 2020-12-31 17:23:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21149417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/multifanwho/pseuds/multifanwho
Summary: After throwing herself in front of two Cybermen in order to protect Yaz and the rest of the fam, the Doctor finds herself on the verge of regeneration being visited by ghosts from her long and tiresome past





	time and time again

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know why I did this but now I'm Sad

The Doctor throws herself stumbling into her home burning up and fading. She can feel herself melting away- an all too familiar sign that soon she’ll be gone completely and be replaced by some stranger in her clothes. She knows she should never have stepped in front of that cyberman but their aim was set dead on Yaz. Two shots. Two hearts. It was an obvious choice, really. Humanity got the best of her and now she's going to end up dead.

“Doctor what do we do?” A panicked Ryan is first to follow her in. He tries to hold her up, stop her from clinging onto the walls, however he can’t be close when all that energy inevitably bubbles up and explodes so she pushes him fiercely away. 

“I’m fine.” She grumbles from a locked jaw, her concentration fixed on the control panel. If she could just get there- she trips over her own feet, arms not reacting quick enough she falls flat on her face. 

“This body…” She sighs, allowing Ryan to help her up again before swiftly shoving the human away again. “Still so bloody unreliable.” 

“What’s going on?” Graham slams the TARDIS doors shut behind Yaz and consequently shutting out the war and chaos outside. “The Doc, is she alright?”

“She got shot twice in the chest gramps, what you you think.” Ryan snaps. 

Or at least the Doctor thinks he snaps because she’s still clinging to her chest, trying to get to the control panel of the TARDIS on whatever sheer strength she has left. _ One step at a time, Doctor _a past version of herself tells her but she can’t put her finger on who. Doctor who?

“Doctor that was the most stupid thing I’ve seen you do yet.” Yaz hisses into her ear, not shouting at her like the boys have. This time, the Doctor lets Yaz’s hands stay touching her, lingering on her body.

“Might be the last thing you see me do.” The Doctor laughs to herself. 

“Doctor.” Yaz stops walking by her side but the Doctor can’t stop now. If she stops now she’ll fall and not get back as herself and stars above she wants to stay in this body for longer than this. “Doctor what do you mean?” 

The Doctor groans as she lifts her leg up onto the upper platform, spit flying from her lips as she exhales from her mouth. _ Almost there. _

“Doctor what do you mean the _ last _ thing I see you do?” Yaz persists in her questioning, returning at her side. She’s persistent, that one.

“I’m regenerating.” The Doctor pushes the words out just loud enough for Yaz to hear over Graham and Ryan’s bickering. Saying it was not the same as accepting it and the Doctor is most certainly refusing. 

“Wha- what does that mean?” Yaz asks through quivering lips. The Doctor can’t bare to look her in the eye. That would hurt more than what’s going to happen next.

“It means I’m going to die.” The Doctor grits her teeth together and reaches her arm out thinking she’s going feel the cool metal of the console under her fingertips. Instead her hand falls through air back to her side and she senses the first hints of giving in.

“Die! C-can’t you just do the orange glowing thing?” Yaz asks desperately. 

“It’s the same thi-” The Doctor’s body seizes up and falls to the floor with a thud accompanied by the clang of metal. Any cuts scrapes or bruises that would logically appear on her body don’t even have the time to form before the first few drops of regeneration energy fix them. 

“Doctor, Doctor come on what do you need?” Yaz hurriedly rolls the Doctor onto her back when she realises she isn’t getting back up by herself.

“Yaz get back from her.” Graham warns. Selfishly, the Doctor grips her fingers around Yaz‘s jacket and catches her eyes to stare right into her soul. If these eyes could choose what their last things to see will be, this is what she wants. 

“Doctor.” Yaz calls her name again, all the training on keeping cool under pressure the police have taught her isn’t keeping her panic from seeping into her voice. Without knowing it, the Doctor’s body starts to go into shock, shivering and sweating and letting her eyes roll back into her head. 

Then suddenly, standing next to Ryan and Graham she’s watching herself writhe and moan on her TARDIS floor, unable to say anything, just simply watch.

_ “Well.” _ She speaks, only heard by her own ear. _ “This is new.” _

“I’m the Doctor polarity temporal flux we need to Gallifrey Oswin Oswald that’s you she’s always Donna Noble has left the library Melody Pond has been saved-”

“What’s she talking about?” Graham stares in bewilderment from a safe distance.

“It’s like she’s malfunctioning.” Ryan says helplessly. 

“Doctor, can you hear me?” Yaz continues to try and get the Doctor to regain consciousness. 

The Doctor meanwhile is stuck listening to her history being repeated back to her from her own mouth in a cluttered order that wouldn’t make sense if this version of herself, the version watching, wasn’t so calm. Calm. It’s a strange state she’s frozen in, watching her friends try to revive her body not knowing what to do at all. 

“-medusa cascade don’t blink don’t blink Roman Rory and the girl who raxacoricofallapatorius blink Missy don't are you Ed Sheeran run bad silence will wolf fall on the powell estate Rose Tyler you are fantastic-” 

“Doctor!” Yaz screams.

“I am, aren’t I.” 

The Doctor is back in her body, the two sentences that snapped her back there seemed to come from one mouth practically on top of her. Everything becomes still. The room, the air, her friends, her hearts. 

“Hello.” The bright blonde with wide eyes and blue leather jacket smiles down on her. 

The sight of her pulls a smile onto her own lips. There are still some voices milling in the background but the Doctor doesn’t- can’t- register them. Rose Tyler is in front of her smiling like nothing is wrong. Maybe there isn’t anything wrong at all. Rose pressed her hand down onto the middle of the Doctor’s chest and the image of her hand flickers. One moment it’s white, the next second it’s brown and Yaz’s voice pushes through and the next moment it’s back to white but this time the Doctor’s nerves are registering pain and only pain. 

“Long time no see, hey.” The Doctor mutters, putting up a front and still keeping her jaw clenched shut in fear that if she lets go the switch will flick and she’ll begin to boil alive.

Yaz says something, she thinks, but the Doctor is more focused on the delightful giggle coming from Rose Tyler’s mouth. 

“So, you’re Northern again.” Rose’s eyes glitter reflecting the TARDIS lights. The universe was truly cruel denying her this sight for years upon years. Reaching out her hand, which she’s forgotten the reason as to why it’s balled up in a tight fist, she reminisces their first adventure together and remembers what she said as clear as day. 

“Lots of planets have a Nor-” The Doctor touches Roses face and a white hot pain seers up her arm making her scrunch her eyes up. Fearing that she won’t be able to open them again, the Doctor forces them open to see Yasmin Khan exactly where Rose Tyler was. It hits her hard. “Of course. Yasmin Khan, you’re just like her.” 

“Like who, Doctor? Who were you speaking to?” Yaz asks. 

“Yaz seriously now, get back from her.” Graham warns again. 

The Doctor looks up to see Graham holding back Ryan from coming to Yaz’s aid. As she looks, though, her fraying attention lands on the sparkling glow around her hands. She lightly pushes Yaz away, knowing her body will be able to withstand her own weight and soon the sweat on her brow will dry. 

“It’s starting.” The Doctor says. The first clear words she’s said in about five minutes. 

“What’s starting?” Ryan asks. 

“Guess it’s finally time to say goodbye.” The Doctor says, examining her shimmering body. "I don't want to say goodbye yet." Looking up again at her friends, the people she crash landed right in front of only the universe knows how long ago and seeing the sadness and confusion on their faces. She would say that the feelings are classic for humans- beautiful wonderful humans- but she was feeling them too. What does that make her? She hopes she’ll have such faith in humanity in her next incarnation. “Look, stay back. After this, it might take a few days for me to remember who you are and who I was but I will remember. I promise I’ll remember please just stick with me on this one.” 

“Doctor-” Yaz steps forward but the Doctor stretches out her arms like a stop sign. 

“Graham.” The Doctor says, signalling with her head for him to come and collect her. He approaches carefully as to not startle Yaz, who doesn’t figure out what’s happening until Graham’s arms are around her waist and dragging her back. 

“No, don’t you dare- Doctor don’t you fucking dare!” Yaz shouts at her. A rush of regeneration energy spikes up the Doctor’s body forcing her to close her eyes again to get it under control and give her enough time for a few more words. _ Alright, alright I’m getting on with it I swear, _she convinces herself; begging herself for a few more seconds, come on hang on for a few more seconds. 

With her eyes closed and all her focus on not disappearing too soon the Doctor doesn’t see Yaz break away from Graham’s grip and swallow her in her arms, hugging her until she almost chokes. 

“Do you really have to go?” Yaz sobs into her shoulder. Any other time the Doctor would have indulged herself in the hug, comforting Yaz with kind words until they both felt better and the warmth of Yaz’s body wouldn’t leave her for a good hour or so. But time, like always, isn’t on her side. 

“Yaz, I’ll kill you.” The Doctor says honestly. 

“Mate we can’t lose both of you.” Ryan calls, coaxing his friend to peel herself away from the Doctor’s body. It works. The Doctor can’t resist her sadness coming through in her smile as she took one last look at them all with these eyes. These eyes that see so much good in the world for once. 

“Help me through this, yeah?” The Doctor asks her final request of them. Graham nods solemnly. Ryan would probably say something like ‘you got it boss’ if he wasn’t glued to staring at the state of the Doctor’s body burning brighter and brighter.

“Doctor.” Yaz says, putting on a brave place. The Doctor begs her new body to give her ears that make Yaz’s voice sound exactly like she hears it now. “Doctor I-”

“I know.” The Doctor forces a smile onto her face through the pain. Her hearts haven’t been beating for a good while now and she’s getting to the point where its stop resisting and regenerate or die. “I’ve known since the day your mum asked. Maybe in the next life?” The Doctor asks hopefully.

“Maybe.” Yaz sighs and smiles quietly through silent tears streaming down her cheeks. 

“Right okay. I’ll see you all in a bit then.” The Doctor smiles at her friends as if to reassure them that this isn’t going to hurt when in fact she’s already told them it hurts more than anything else in the known universe. If not physically, then definitely emotionally. Raising outstretched arms to shoulder level without consciously giving the command to her nervous system, the Doctor knows it’s time. “Let’s get a shift on.” She mutters.

Unballing her fist the energy surges through her, evoking a scream louder than the roar of the Earth’s sun from the pit of her stomach, the Doctor feels herself slip away into the mess.


End file.
